Puttering and Its Importance

One of the chief complaints I hear from my girlfriends is that we, 20-somethings living in a big city trying to elbow our way through and stake some sort of claim in this world, don’t have enough time for ourselves. But that makes sense. We live in a goal-oriented society where there is always more room for hard work and there is always someone out there working harder than you. We believe that we have small windows of opportunity that we’re going to miss and only recognize in hindsight. Everything feels like it is of the utmost importance. Every decision feels like it will either make or break us. No wonder there are so many articles online about anxiety in our 20s.

But there’s also something so beautifully energetic about this mindset. We vibrate with potential. We observe and insert ourselves into the world around us with such intensity. It’s so easy to get caught up in the routines and the chase and the quest for “who we will become” that it’s difficult to remember to pause sometimes. We have to pause to think and let our minds wander. Not for any purpose other than to take in the beauty of all of this. To be in your 20s and hustling is one of the only times in our lives that we are 49 different people all at once. All of these parts of ourselves are playing musical chairs with each other. We need to let them be free to try things.

We need time to sit with ourselves and let our minds wander. Draw even if the end result is that you’ll shove the drawing under your bed and forget about it. Dance around your apartment not for exercise but because it feels good. Moodle, whatever that means to you, simply so that you can say you moodled. Yes, its important to have intention and be productive. But busyness for the sake of being busy isn’t worth anything. An activity doesn’t need purpose other than the fact that you love doing it. Let your imagination wander and revel in the fact that you’re living and you get to be silly.